A Missing Bat
by Addie Lover of Stories
Summary: This fic goes along w/Red Hood meets Marvel. If you haven't read that one, I suggest you do. The stories happen at the same time, but they start at slightly different points and deviate early on. Cover art isn't mine. When Red Hood gets shot and disappears, Dick is crushed, the whole Batfam is crushed. But what if Jason isn't really dead? How will they get him back?
1. Chapter 1

A/N(03/20/17): THIS HAS BEEN HEAVILY EDITED! IF IT'S POPPING UP AGAIN FOR YOU, THERE'S A REASON! PLEASE REREAD THIS!

Seriously guys, I just changed a lot of the second half of this and this version is a whole lot better and quite a bit different. So please read!

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Chapter 1

"Well, I'll tell you what we'll do. We'll-" Nightwing abruptly stopped talking to the little girl in front of him as he spotted one of the thug's he'd thought to be unconscious lifting the gun he'd knocked out of the weird masked guy's hand, and he quickly changed what he was saying.

"HOOD, BEHIND YOU!"

Hood whirled around, but it was too late, the thug had already fired and it caught Hood head on. Nightwing's next action he did without thinking, anger burning his lungs. He leapt forward, taking out the thug as viciously and efficiently as a snake strikes its prey. But he didn't wait for that prey to hit the floor before he was turning back to his brother, scoping him up into his arms. All the sounds around him faded, the police sirens, the medics screaming instructions for the people they'd already gotten outside, all of it. All he could hear was his own heartbeat pounding in his ears and Jason. Dick couldn't lose him, he wouldn't! He'd already lost him before; he wouldn't let that happen again.

"Jason! Come on! Come on Jay, stay with me, you're going to be fine, come on! Come on Little Wing! You are not dying on me! Not this time! Not when I'm right here! I got you Jay, I got you! Come on, stay with me!"

Dick rocked him in his arms and his fingers fumbled with Jason's stupid helmet, trying to get it off to see his brothers face, but it wouldn't come. It wouldn't come. So Dick ripped off his own mask instead, already wet from tears, hoping that if Jason saw his eyes, maybe, maybe he'd listen, maybe he'd stay. He could feel Jason's breathe stuttering, could hear him gasping. Dick felt for the wound. If he could slow the bleeding, do something, maybe, maybe his little brother would be ok!

But-, but-, there was no wound. The shot had been something different, something he couldn't stop. Couldn't slow. DAMN IT! HE WAS SUPPOSED TO BE THE BIG BROTHER! HE WAS SUPPOSED TO PROTECT HIM!

But, but he couldn't. He couldn't save him. And now, now he was going to lose him again.

Suddenly, Jason started glowing, the light starting from where the wound should've been and enveloping all of him, shining brighter and brighter as it went.

"No! No! NO! Not him! DON'T TAKE HIM FROM ME! NOT HIM! Not him! Please! Please! Not him!"

But the light didn't stop. It didn't stop. And then just as suddenly as the glow had started it stopped. And Jason was gone.

"NO! NO! NOT HIM! NOT JASON! Not again! No! No no no no NO! Not again. WHY?! WHY HIM?! WHY DID IT have to be him?"

Sobs choked his words, and they devolved into incomprehensible mumblings as he clutched the empty air in his arms that had only moments ago been holding his little brother. Dick felt numb, he couldn't, couldn't comprehend what was happening. It couldn't be real; this had to be a nightmare! It HAD to be!

But the little girl they'd saved was still there, crying and terrified. In the nightmares, after this happened, everything else faded away, there was nothing but blood, bodies, and the screams. But she was still there. And so Dick let the numbness take over, the numbness that wouldn't accept Jason's death as truth, that couldn't accept all this as a reality, and that allowed him to move, to get up and do what needed to be done regardless of his grief, and he slowly stood, silent tears still running down his cheeks, and went over and hugged the little girl. And told her what he knew in his heart wasn't true.

"Shhh, it's alright. It's gonna be alright."

Dick carefully put his mask back on, but did nothing to hide the tears. He couldn't if he tried.

"Let's go find your parents, okay Hun? I need you to do me a great big favor though. Is that okay? I need you to keep this a secret for me, can you do that?"

His voice was shaky and broken, and so, so quiet it was barely a whisper, but the girl still gave a shaky nod, her own sobs clogging her throat. Nightwing held her tighter, and whispered a shaky thank you into her hair. Slowly, gently, he let her go, leaving only a reassuring hand on her shoulder as he lead them outside. As soon as they got out of the building, the little girl sprinted into the waiting arms of her father, cries finally swallowing her little body while gentle reassurances flowed from her father's mouth, her mother clutching her close and joining her with a different kind of tears. Nightwing simply turned away and disappeared into the night before the police could ask him anything. He didn't think he could stand their questions right now. Even with the numbness enveloping him.

He didn't know how he got back to the Batcave. He didn't know when he did either. All he knew was that that was where he was, and that worried questions were attacking him from muted voices coming from all sides. Hands gripped his arms and tried to shake him out of whatever state he was in, but he couldn't speak. He couldn't-, he couldn't. He felt like an empty husk. And then he felt gentle hands wrap him in a hug, and he just broke down.

He didn't know when he stopped crying. He didn't know when he fell asleep, but when he woke up in his room, he woke to a warm weight laying across his chest. Looking down it seemed at some point during the night Damian had pulled up a chair to watch over him and had fallen asleep. Cass was there as well, laying next to him, arms curled protectively around him. It took DIck a second to remember why they'd be there, but when he did it was like the weight of the world had come crashing down on him. A gasping sob escaped him and beside him Cass snapped awake and quickly sat up while Damian slept on.

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Cass POV:

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"Dick-?" She whispered, pulling him tighter in her arms

"He's gone-, oh god! He's gone!" He cried quietly, blankly looking at the ceiling.

"Who's gone?" She asked gently, worry building in the pit of her stomach, reading the grief rolling off his body in waves, crashing into her like a tsunami. Cassandra didn't think she'd ever seen Dick like this, numb, unresponsive, grief-stricken; It was scaring her. She was so used to his smiles, even when she knew so many of them simply hid the blizzard of emotions he felt underneath, so used to his hyperness, his constant need for motion, his friendliness; he was always so- alive. No matter what. Even when she saw his body screaming of exhaustion. This was nothing like that. It was like the life had been drained from him, and it hurt to see him like this.

"Jason- they shot him. I, I couldn't save him. I was right there! And I couldn't save him!" Guilt, guilt, guilt, clinging to him like a leech, guilt- and grief, so much grief, and now she understood why. And she was angry. No one hurt her family. No one took them from her; she'd gone through too much already to give them up. Who ever had done this was going to pay- and she knew some of the darkest ways to do it. She'd grown up an assassin, fighting was all she'd known. Her father had made her into a human weapon.

She'd promised herself she'd never kill again, not after the first time. Not after she saw what it meant, saw the life leave that man's eyes. But she didn't have to kill. She had other ways of making people's life hell.

"Who did this?" She growled, fury and hurt mixing, building within her, eyes clamped on Dick's figure, his body still holding so much pain. Pain that she couldn't do anything about, pain that she felt deep in her bones, pain that crept into her too. She and Jason hadn't been close, but he was her brother, and she'd loved him like one. But she wasn't good with words. Her father had stolen those from her long ago. She couldn't help Dick like he would need help, and she couldn't express just how deeply this hurt. How much she wanted to cry, and rage, and change time. She couldn't express it in words, and so she would do it in the only way she knew how, violence.

But now, in this moment, that was not yet the right choice, DIck needed her now. He wasn't ready for words yet, though he would need them soon. Till then she would hold him in her arms and help him all she could, and when the time came that she could no longer help, that was when she would rage.

Dick gave a broken laugh that screamed of sorrow.

" I, I don't know. They were nobodies, they should've been nobodies- but they killed him. And now he's gone. I couldn't save him. I tried- I tried! But there wasn't- it wasn't a normal gun- I couldn't stop it. It wouldn't stop- and now he's gone!" His body shook, an earthquake of grief beneath his skin, sorrow flooding his eyes, voice trembling, and she held him tighter, as tight as she could without hurting him, ignoring the wet of tears that reached her skin. Jason, Jason wasn't killed normally then, he'd just-, disappeared. There was nothing they could've done. Cassandra wasn't sure if that made it better or worse. Better that they couldn't have done anything anyway, couldn't have failed him, couldn't have made things worse. Or worse that they had just been useless. Either way, it didn't give her the answers she so needed. But she would get them. She would figure out what killed him, who killed him, why they'd taken her brother from her. And then she'd make them pay. Make sure they'd never hurt her family ever again, make sure they understood, that they felt, the pain that they had made her feel. Looking at the crying man in her arms, and the waking boy beside him, she promised herself that.

"Grayson-?" Damian asked sleep still scratching at his voice; eyes blinking worriedly open as his brother's sobs woke him. The boy's eyes darted to her, questioning, his body reading, echoing, of worry, confusion- fear. Fear of seeing his brother like this, what had made him like this. She shook her head gently. 'Don't ask, little brother. I will tell you later.' Damian nodded, still worrying, but he understood what she meant, saw her words though her body like she saw through him every time she looked. For now he'd just be here for his brother, even though she saw it scared him. His brother, who had acted like a father towards him while his own was gone, looking so broken.

Watching as the boy carefully crawled onto the bed and curled around Dick, she could see- all he wanted was for this to stop. She saw it in his tensed shoulders; saw it in the way he moved, the way he snuggled close. Saw it in his searching hands, hands that searched for comfort, searched for something that would make him feel less useless in this situation, searched for something he could fix. He wanted so desperately to fix this, to make things better, even when he didn't yet know what was wrong. She could see this whole situation felt wrong to him, and she had to agree. It was wrong to see her brother like this, so utterly broken. It was wrong to know her other brother would never come home again, never laugh with them again, never play rooftop tag, never stop to get ridiculously greasy food, never read to her, never, never, never. It was so wrong. A wrong so deep it felt like it was etched into her skin, digging for her heart. So, incredibly, wrong. And now she was crying too. Silent, quiet tears. The only ones she'd ever known. Now though, they seemed endless. And she was suddenly glad Damian had closed his eyes once more. He didn't need to see her like this; she didn't want to scare him anymore than he already was.

She knew the others would check on them soon, they were worried too. Beyond worried. They'd been searching for answers since Dick had stumbled into the cave last night, unresponsive and shaking, and they would have questions. Questions that Dick wouldn't want to answer- couldn't deal with answering yet, and she didn't want to either. Didn't-, couldn't, deal with it yet. And so she closed her eyes, and just let herself cry.

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A/N: And that's it for this one! Hopefully I did all of the Batfam justice, I did my best, but I'm not 100% sure about how they turned out. If you would leave me a review about what you guys think that'd be awesome! And if you think there's something I need to change, please tell me! I want to do my best to get this right. X) Thank you guys!


	2. Chapter 2

A/N: THIS IS IMPORTANT! If you're reading this, please know that if you haven't read the edited version of the first chapter, this won't make much sense to you. PLEASE go read that if you haven't. That being said, i hope you enjoy!

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Tim POV:

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When Dick had staggered in that night, Tim had thought he'd been gassed, it was the only time he'd seen Dick act even close to this. But he wasn't, they'd checked. Scarecrow was still locked up in Arkham, and while some other criminal might've been able to get their hands on the drug somehow, they knew that wasn't the case. They'd run Dick's blood for traces of any detrimental substances five times now, there was nothing. No answers, no clues. Nothing that could tell them what had happened or how they could help.

Tim had been hacking into cameras along Dick's patrol routes for the last five hours trying to find any clues as to what had happened, but so far it was looking just like a normal night. He watched Nightwing swinging from roof to roof, flipping and cartwheeling, diving into alleys and beating up criminals, or would-be-criminals, but so far, nothing was really standing out. Till, that was, Nightwing stopped and took a break on a phone line.

He knew that Oracle had some cameras up in that area, but none of them had the right angle to see what was going only footage Tim could get of the scene was from a shotty camera with fuzzy film and a cracked lens. Even after enhancing it, it was still horrible. But from what he could see, Nightwing was taking a short break on the phone wire when a figure approached him. The figure stood too far in the shadows and the film was too crappy for Tim to make out who it was, despite his best efforts. All Tim could tell was the figure was male, and about as tall and wide as Bruce, and TIm could only tell that after Nightwing had jumped down to meet him and he was able to compare their frames. That and the figure's shoulders were much too wide to be a woman's.

It looked to Tim as if they were simply talking, and then Nightwing tossed something to the figure and five seconds later they were sprinting off and swinging to the next roof, and it was as they were leaping to the next roof that Tim got a glimpse of who the figure was. A man, wearing a red hood.

"What does Hood have to do with this?" Tim muttered softly to himself, not even realizing he was saying anything.

"Did you say something Master Timothy?" Alfred asked behind him, setting a steaming cup of coffee just within reach where it wouldn't be knocked over. SInce Dick had gotten in, Alfred had been anxious, not that you would ever see it just from looking, but he was. You could tell in the way he straightened and doubled checked, heck, triple checked, the med bay supplies, how he doted on his wards, making sure they had everything they would need, or could need, how he continuously reassured himself that they were safe and well, you could see it in how he constantly found more to do, never let himself rest enough to really think about all the horrible possibilities of what might've happened. Tim glanced at him with a quick smile before he was turning back.

"Hmm? Oh it's nothing. Thanks Alfred." Alfred raised his eyebrow at that, made no comment on it.

"Very well Master Timothy." With that Alfred withdrew to check once more on the others, and Tim was back to hacking. Quickly, Tim set about following the two vigilantes he'd spotted though the last camera. Watching through a nearby building's security cameras, he saw them perch on the building across the way from one of the city's banks and evaluate the robbery he could see taking place inside. So far it was still looking like a normal night, despite Hood joining Nightwing. It was, after all, not unusual to see the two of them patrolling together. Since they'd discovered who Hood was, Nightwing had pushed to be closer to his brother, but Hood had been hesitant at first, which made sense from what Tim had heard about their past. Apparently, Dick and Jason hadn't had the best relationship before Jason died, Dick had fought to much with Bruce to really be close to Jason while he was living at the manor- but since Jason had gotten back, Dick had taken it as his personal mission to make up for it. And he had, Jason and Dick had gotten closer over the last few years; that was obvious to everyone in their little family. So the fact that they had been patrolling together last night didn't really surprise Tim much, especially since Jason had been away for so long on an outlaw mission with Roy and Kori, and Dick had no doubt missed him and bullied him into coming out with him.

Continuing to watch, Tim noted how well they were working together nowadays as well, observing how they practically danced around each other taking down thugs and evacuated hostages with vicious and graceful efficiency. There was a small hiccup with the rescue when a masked man started threatening a little girl, but even that his brothers handled with ease.

And then, it all went wrong.

They had had everyone down, checking on the little girl, and then suddenly, Jason was being shot. Nightwing was panicking, screaming and crying. Saying Jason's real name. And then Jason was just, _gone_. Disappearing in a flash of blue light. And Nightwing broke down.

Tim quickly emailed the footage to Barbara knowing she and Bruce would want it to check over exactly what happened, wiped all footage of the scene from any and all of the cameras that saw or picked up sound from the scene and shut down his computer.

...It made so much sense now. Why Dick had been so out of it, so distraught. Dick, he hadn't even been on the planet the last time Jason… He hadn't been there and he had still felt so much guilt. Guilt for not being there, for not being better to his brother, for not doing _something,_ even though there was no way he could've done anything. And now- now Dick had been _right_ _**there,**_ and he still hadn't been able to do _anything._ He had, in his mind, failed his brother. He hadn't saved him, even though this time there was surely something he could've done to stop it, _should've_ done. He should've been better, should've been able to stop the shot, should've been able to protect his brother. But he couldn't save him. Didn't save him. That was what Dick was thinking.

Dick would blame himself, was blaming himself, Tim knew that. Because that's who Dick was. After his parents death, Dick had in his own way formed himself into everyone else's safety net, because he didn't want to see them fall too, couldn't bare to see them fall too. He protected them when they needed him, caught them when they fell, and always supported them, because that who he was, he was their safety net. And this time, he hadn't caught them in time, and Jason had fallen.

Tim _needed_ to check on Dick. He couldn't be okay right now, he needed them. This thought leapt into life and raged around his mind like wildfire, and it was almost like his feet had taken on a life of their own as they leapt from his seat, not even pausing for his hand to give the chair a push into place as they flew to the stairs, deciding it would take too long to wait for the elevators, and rushed down the halls, bursting into Dick's room. The sight that waited for him there was not what he was quite expecting.

Tim knew that Cass and Damian had taken Dick to his room and were watching over him till he was ready to talk to someone, but TIm was never expecting to come in to see Cass crying. Dick, yes. He knew Dick would be, but TIm had never seen Cass cry. Over anything. Cass was always in touch with others emotions, reading them off of people came as easily to her as breathing, but she herself was a usually stoic figure. Seeing her crying froze all of the thoughts flying around his head and brought them all crashing down. Just the sight of it seemed so wrong, and Tim wasn't sure what he should do. And how he should respond was yet another of the frozen thoughts that had come to an abrupt stop in his head, leaving him drawing an absolute blank. To see her crying, it was unsettling, even though Tim understood it. The wet trails done his face proved that.

His feet had stop just as abruptly as his thoughts did though, and momentum caught up with him in seconds, pushing him forward and almost sending him crashing to the floor. If it hadn't been for his training he would've face planted. As it was, it still caused a wisp of a giggle from the other side of the room before he scrambled to his feet.

There on the bed Dick laid asleep, Cass and Damian tucked on either side of him with only Cass awake. Tear tracks were still heavily present on Dick's face, though they seemed to be drying. ' _Dick must've woken up a little while ago_ ,' Tim thought observing the tangled bodies, ' _He probably told Cass what happened before he fell back asleep, that must be why she's crying.'_

Looking up at him, Cass gave a sad, small smile.

"You saw what happened." She said, not asking. She didn't need to, she already knew. Tim nodded back, his voice felt trapped in his throat, caught on the rock lodged there. She nodded and opened her arm that wasn't trapped between her and Dick's bodies, offering him to join them, offering him comfort, support. TIm padded over silently, mindful of his sleeping brothers as he crawled across the bed to lay beside Cass, who turned and pulled him closer, wrapping her arm around his shoulders.

"I knew going into this that it would be dangerous, I knew we could die. I just never dreamt…" Tim whispered softly after a few minutes of soothing silence. Cass nodded and pulled him tighter for a few seconds before relaxing again.

"I know. I know." She whispered just as quietly, and silence fell again, filled only by the momentary sounds of sniffling and tears.


End file.
